Is religion “back in fashion” in America? Recent coverage by CNN highlighted data showing that the median in-person worship attendance is on the rise for the first time in decades. Researchers with Hartford Institute for Religion Research, which conducted the study of 7,453 congregations, told CNN they were so surprised by the results they spent weeks re-checking the data.
The data shows an increase in median worship attendance to 70 in 2025 from a low of 45 during the pandemic 2021. But even accounting for the impact of Covid-19 on in-person worship, the median worship attendance in 2025 still showed an increase from a pre-pandemic total of 65, bucking a years-long downward trend.
“The biggest surprise to me was that median worship size had increased,” Scott Thumma, director of the Hartford Institute for Religion Research, told CNN. “In my entire career … the size of congregations, the membership numbers, worship attendance — everything has trended downward for the last 40 years. To have this not only rebound from pandemic lows, but actually to go above where congregations were in 2020 before the pandemic, was really surprising to me.”
The study, “Signs of Rebound Amid Uneven Recovery: The Changing Congregational Landscape,” is based on a survey of congregational leadership across multiple denominations and faith groups between September and December 2025. Previous surveys conducted between 2000-2020 and 2021 to 2023 add context to the data. The increase in congregation size is the first uptick researchers have noted since 2000, when the group first started tracking worship attendance. That year, median attendance was 137.
The study includes 79 denominations and faith traditions, but responses to the survey were weighted to match the distribution of religious traditions across the country, according to the research summary. The responses include 71% Evangelical Protestant denominations, Pentecostal traditions, and other conservative Protestant Christian groups, researchers wrote, along with 21% mainline Protestant and some progressive Protestant congregations and 4% from non-Christian traditions including Muslim, Jewish, Bahá’í, Hindu, and Buddhist religious groups.
“…Growth in particular groups or traditions does not necessarily translate into broader religious vitality universally,” researchers wrote. “The key question, then, is not simply whether some congregations are growing, but whether the nation’s faith communities as a whole are experiencing increased vitality-and if so, where, how, and for whom.”
The study offers a “cautiously affirmative” answer. It notes other optimistic findings including a rebound in volunteer participation from pre-pandemic levels, an increase in congregational income and improvements in clergy well-being. 58% of congregational leaders told researchers their congregation is stronger now than before the pandemic. But researchers stressed that recovery has been uneven, and many challenges remain. Despite the recent uptick, worship attendance is still far below what it was decades ago.
“There is little evidence of a broad religious revival capable of offsetting decades of decline and institutional strain,” researchers wrote. “Many congregations continue to face structural pressures that will shape their futures in the years ahead. Even so, the current findings suggest a shift in momentum: a renewed – if cautious – sense of possibility has emerged within many faith communities. As these data indicate, resilience remains a defining characteristic of American congregational life.”
Still, the survey is just one piece of a much broader, and complex, puzzle. Researchers with Pew, citing surveys of individuals (rather than congregational leaders) described a recent period of “stability” in Americans who identify as religious. Pew’s polling finds that since 2020, there’s been no significant rise or fall in the number of U.S. adults who identify with a religion (about 70%). But taken in a broader context, that data is a notable part of the story.
“The recent stability is striking because it comes after prolonged periods of religious decline,” Pew researchers wrote. “For decades, measures of religious belonging, behaving, and believing had been dropping nationwide.”
Pew notes that the long-term decline has been driven in large parts by generational shifts – older people, who tend to be more religious, have died, and younger people tend to be less religious. Recent media reports have indicated a recent surge in interest in religion in younger people, however, Pew noted their research hasn’t found indications of a religious revival among American youth. And a BBC report highlights questions around recent data showing an increase in church attendance among Gen Z in England and Wales.
But other media reports point to pockets of renewed religious interest in youth, especially those in the Catholic faith. A survey by the National Catholic Register found that many Catholic dioceses are reporting increases in people joining the church, including some with record highs. Many of those who are converting to the faith are young people, CNN reports.
“What really inspired my conversion was recently thinking more about why we’re here, what’s more important than myself? And the people who really had an answer for me, that made sense to me, and that I thought was morally right, were the Catholics,” Cameron Hubbard, who converted to Catholicism, told CNN.
The increase may be in part attributable to the popularity of the first US-born Pope, Leo XIV – what Father Joseph Ferrell, Vicar General of the Order of St. Augustine, described to CNN as “The Leo effect.”
CNN Vatican analyst Katie McGrady, appearing in a recent CNN segment, said youth are showing increased curiosity in the Catholic faith as they search for stability in a world filled with upheaval. And many young people who struggle with isolation are looking to the church for increased social connection, McGrady said.
“With Gen Z, they’re looking around and they’re saying, well where are not just the like-minded people, but people who seem to be happy, who seem to be filled with joy, who seem to be living for something that’s more than just their next paycheck, and they’re finding it at church,” McGrady said.
But whether the increase in youth converts today translates into an increase in church membership in the long term remains to be seen, McGrady said.
“I think what we’re really going to see, when revival can really be proven, is do these people stick around? Do they get married in the church? Do they baptize their children in the church? Do they maybe even pursue a religious education – are we going to see a seminary increase?” McGrady said. “The data shows the numbers of converts are up in all of the dioceses across the country. How does that translate after this year into how much commitment these people are making? That’s really what the church has to figure out right now.”